My Dinner with Jon (Huntsman)

by Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp

Last week the electioneering ebbed, Democrats heaved sighs of relief, and Republicans began their tortured explanations of the outcome of the presidential race.  Bloggers of things Mormon began to air their own anxieties about the future:  what would Mitt Romney’s loss mean for Mormon studies? 

More important, and at the risk of driving this academic-narcissism-in-the-guise-of-soul-searching into the ground, is what it might mean for the study of religion in the American West.  Enough about Mormon Studies . . . what about us?

Without wading too far into the numbers, it seems quite evident that the evangelical distaste for a Mormon candidate—and more pointedly, the southern evangelical distaste—was vastly overinflated.  Yes, Romney won Utah and Idaho and Arizona, but look at that solid Mormon South!  Equally important is the fact that, even with large numbers of Mormons on the West Coast, he didn’t stand a chance there.  So was his problem a regional thing, a religious thing, or some of both?

Years ago sociologist Armand Mauss used survey data to suggest that there are profound differences in the outlooks and attitudes of LDS who live west of Utah (he was looking at California in particular).  I was reminded of this, and of the complexities of regional and religious identities, when I met Governor Jon Huntsman recently.

Huntsman came to the university where I work to deliver the Weil Lecture on American Citizenship, a series that has brought in a wide variety of illustrious figures of many political persuasions beginning with William Howard Taft in 1915.  I was asked to attend a dinner in Huntsman’s honor and to introduce him before he spoke, an invitation at which I jumped.  I’ve been curious for a long time about his background and his relationship to the Mormon tradition.  He is a descendent of Mormon pioneer stock who served a mission, but who now seems actively to resist the urgings of the press to gauge his level of piety.  Unlike other Republican candidates during the primary season who fell over one another to express their sincere love of Jesus, Huntsman consistently demurred when provoked to discuss his faith.  He and his wife have two adopted young daughters, one from China and one from India, and they are raising them as Buddhist and Hindu, respectively.  What’s up with that?

This might well be my chance to figure it all out, I thought. 

The details, as it turned out, are far more interesting that I had thought.  Gov. Huntsman, you see, is a California Mormon.  In fact, he and I were born one month and about 20 miles apart in the Bay Area.  One of his grandfathers was the mayor of my hometown, and ran the local hardware store there.  When he was an infant Huntsman’s parents moved to southern California, where the young Jon was raised.  We had a lovely conversation about these early connections.

I mentioned to him, by the way, that I also studied Mormons.  But that really didn’t seem to interest him. When queried from the audience by a campus minister about how he understood the appropriate place of religious faith in the political world, Huntsman talked of ecumenism, tolerance, and celebration of difference.  Nary a word about deep personal faith, even of the very private sort.

[As an aside, he wowed the packed audience of young students (many budding business majors).  They cheered his statements about collaboration across political boundaries, about the corrosive role of money in elections, and about the necessity for the U.S. to negotiate with international partners rather than trying to bully them into submission.  He talked with particular passion about the importance of China, a subject about which, as a former U.S. Ambassador and a fluent speaker of Mandarin, he knows a great deal.

I have to say, he impressed me, too.  My jaw clenched a bit when he talked about a limited federal government.  But there was no getting around his centrist politics, his belief in the reality of climate change, and his apparent openness to dialogue.  I suspect that many of us there saw, for the first time in a long while, a way to move forward through partisanship to a shared future.  One colleague of mine even asked him the glaringly obvious question:  why does he remain a Republican when his own club seems to have revoked his membership card?]

Political questions notwithstanding, I was initially frustrated by my failure to gain much traction on his religious self-understanding.  Yet as I thought more about it later, I realized that he, in fact, was like many of the Mormons—and Catholics, Jews, Protestants, and Buddhists—that I had grown up with in California in the 1960s and 1970s.  We put a premium on toleration (although we didn’t call it that—in fact, we didn’t call it anything), in part because we had to in order to find common ground as friends and neighbors.  We lived in a region with longstanding communities of Japanese, Chinese, South Asians, Irish and Italian Catholics, and other migrants to the mobile society of the post-World War II coastal industries.  We had no established majority of one particular religious group, and that diversity made a difference in how we thought about religion itself.  It’s hard to describe or to capture, but we wore our religion differently there—certainly, it was different from what I’ve encountered in the Northeast and the South.

From a distance, too, I think that form of religiosity can look a lot like Sheilaism, to use Robert Bellah’s characterization of “do it yourself” faith.  Or, when pressed by journalists for a statement or a faith stance, it can look like indifference.  Pollsters, with their targeted questions framed in other contexts, might well call these people “nones.”  For me, at least, and those I grew up with, it was not any of these things.  We had commitments to religious institutions—sometimes to several, and that was okay.  We may well have family members, as I do, who are Jungian Catholics, born again evangelicals, secular humanists, Buddhists, and mainline Protestants. 

We speak a different religious language as a result.  And that’s the language I heard Jon Huntsman speaking (when he wasn’t breaking into Mandarin).  I’m not saying it is the wave of the future; indeed, his dismal showing among Republicans would suggest otherwise.  It’s not Mormon in the Utah style, but neither is it a turning away from that faith. And it may reflect a particular era of California’s history that has now been overtaken by the western Southerners that Darren Dochuk so engagingly describes. 

But it should prompt us to search for more nuanced ways of thinking about western religiosity, ways that don’t bind us solely to denominational or confessional frameworks.  Let’s get busy constructing some new paradigms that capture cultural affiliations outside those already designated as “religion.”  It’s the “all or nothing” framework, one encouraged rhetorically by those who would like to corner the market on faith as a branding mechanism, that stops us from recognizing the very commonalities that may well be our salvation.

Casual Friday: The Columbus of Denver

When I was in Denver for the Western History Association conference last month, I was wandering around downtown and noticed a few monuments in a park. Two of them didn't surprise me, bronze sculptures titled "Bronco Buster" and "On the War Path": stereotypical images you expect to see in the West.

A third monument, not far from the other two, however, surprised me. It was not something I was expecting to see in Denver. It is a monument to Columbus. He apparently had four arms and four legs.

What was even odder than the image, however, was the wording on the plaque. Here's the text, placed there in 1970:

Italian Visionary and Great Navigator 
This bold explorer was the first European
to set foot on uncharted land, on a West Indies
beach in 1492. His four voyages brought Europe
and the Americas together, forever changing
history. A new nation was to rise. A new
Democracy was born.

In researching a little about the monument, I discovered that Denver has apparently become the host of two annual Columbus Day parades, one honoring Columbus with the other being a counter demonstration. During a 1989 demonstration the monument was splashed with fake blood, for which AIM activist Russell Means was tried and found not guilty for defacement of the monument.

So, for those of you more familiar with the patriotic and religious makeup of Colorado, what is this monument doing in downtown Denver?

Book of the Month

Reid Neilson. Exhibiting Mormonism: The Latter-day Saints and the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.

Review by Konden R. Smith

Back in January, Laurie Maffly-Kipp brought up the question regarding Mormonism’s status as a “western” religious tradition. Rather than answering this question, she turned the question around by asking why such labels have been so important and used in the first place. In short, what was at stake in its usage? I think an important answer to this question comes from the Mormon presence at the Chicago World’s Fair (aka. Columbian Exposition) of 1893, covered in Reid Neilson's Exhibiting Mormonism: The Latter-day Saints and the 1893 World’s Fair (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011). At this fair, Utah’s non-Mormon Governor Caleb West re-introduced Mormons as loyal patriots and archetypal developers of the American West. “These pioneers of Utah blazed the way for the westward course of empire, and at the time of their first entrance into the valley of the Great Salt Lake planted the flag of the union on foreign soil.” In part due to West’s successful repositioning of Mormonism under this “western” banner, Americans began, for the first time in American history, to re-imagine Mormons as acceptably American. Recognizing this new and unprecedented national interest in Mormonism, Mormon leaders introduced themselves as “pioneers” rather than “prophets,” and their talking points were buffalos, women’s suffrage and pioneering rather than the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith or religious persecution. Defining Mormonism as a “western” religion was thus a pivotal moment in Mormon history and the history of American religious pluralism.

The argument behind Exhibiting Mormonism was straightforward: to demonstrate how Mormonism went from a narrow “missionary-minded people to a twentieth-century evangelistic and public relations juggernaut” (7). Although Neilson’s focus was largely on Mormonism’s public relations conversion and subsequent change in policy and attitude toward the outside world, Neilson recognized a broader significance of the international event and the correlated Mormon response. It was, he explains, “a larger story of the church’s accommodation and assimilation into the larger American religious mainstream,” and as such opens itself up for comparative studies of American minority relations and transformation (207). Importantly, the hinge in this pivot was in Mormonism being redefined as “western,” and thereby “American.”  

By way of organization, Neilson charts Mormonism’s response to American culture in three parts. (1) 1830-46: The founding period where Mormons sought to convert, not befriend the nation and world. (2) 1847-1890: The pioneer period that was marked as largely non-violent, with the exceptions of the Utah War, 1857-58, and the three decade long “cold war” surrounding the question of Mormon politics, economy and sexuality. Public relations during this period were not important and Mormon provocations were common. (3) 1890-today: Exceptionally strong focus on public relations and education (16-17). As Neilson demonstrates, this last phase did not really take off with the surrender of polygamy in 1890, but more importantly the World’s Fair three years later.

Neilson clarifies that Mormons did not simply “attend” the fair. Their presence was rather complicated, being celebrated and cheered in one section and then rejected and insulted in another. In the chapter that outlines this acceptance, Neilson provides an overview of the size and complexities of the fair itself. In an exhibition of “Utah Territory,” Mormons displayed their “western” identity to the nation. Over two million visitors toured the Utah building, having a dramatic impact on how non-Mormons saw Mormons and how Mormons sought to present themselves. As part of this new “western” presentation, Utah was represented by way of mineral deposits and mummies, rather than Mormons and polygamy.

Perhaps most profound to the question of Mormonism’s entrance into Americana is Nielson’s chapter on Mormon women at the fair, as it was them who led this early “Mormon moment.” Whatever success Mormon leaders found at the fair, Mormon women had already “woven themselves into the larger fabric of domestic and international feminism,” and, as such, found themselves well received (102). With much less foresight, male leaders initially resisted representation at the fair and remained outside and detached from ecumenical associations, such as the Evangelical Alliance. With a desire to be part of the national female suffrage movement, Mormon women early on recognized the value of national inclusion. Ironically, popular portrayals of Mormon women were that of being slow, stupid, and mere erotic tools of Mormon male masters. Participation at the World’s Congress of Representative Women was thus not only a watershed moment for the American feminist movement, but as Neilson demonstrates, allowed Mormon feminism to merge with that of the national. The Mormon female Relief Society and the Young Ladies Mutual Improvement Association (YLMIA) stood side-by-side at the fair with the National Council of Women of the United States (NCW) (104).     

Beyond the Mormon female presence at the fair, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir at the Welsh Eisteddfod, an international musical competition associated with the fair, proved the magical element for healing Mormon-American relations. Welsh Americans looked to such an event as a way to demonstrate their retention of Welsh culture and musical influence within America. For Welsh Mormon immigrants, such as Mormon Tabernacle Choir conductor Evan Stephens, the choral competition represented a similar opportunity to display Welsh civilization and Americanism as filtered through the Mormon machine. Though being redefined as “western,” Mormon sophistication emerged, in part, outside the US. In an attempt to be more warmly welcomed as “Americans,” Mormons from various nationalities heartily embraced this new “western” national identity, however Danish, Welsh, or English they were. The result of this appropriation was a resounding success, as Neilson put it, “thanks in large measure to the Tabernacle Choir, the Chicago World’s Fair seemed to mark a new dawn for the public image of the church, at least as a cultural institution,…” (144).

But as Neilson explains in a later chapter, not all was well for Mormonism at the fair. Though it was true that Mormon leaders at first saw little importance with the fair, Mormon orator and leader Brigham H. Roberts was the exception. In what amounted to a story of excellent drama, Roberts convinced leaders of the Parliament of Religions to bring him on as a speaker. Parliament organizers finally agreed, but following a speech on Islam that defended the practice of polygamy, the polygamous Roberts found his speech sidelined and he left the parliament resentful and bitter. But Roberts had friends, most importantly a Roman Catholic parliament official who defended Mormonism and decried its exclusion as ignorance and prejudice.  

Being largely descriptive rather than analytic, Exhibiting Religion proves an important contribution to the study of the American West. Beyond this, it is an important contribution to Mormon Studies and its larger patterns of religious accommodation, boundary maintenance and identity formation more generally. My only real criticism of Neilson’s work is that it lacks analysis in any broad way. The focus is on Mormonism and its entrance into the American heart and its consequent conversion to PR. But Neilson’s stated goal was not to bring in this national and even international religious, political, economic, and cultural context. Instead Neilson leaves intact the larger implications of this dynamic encounter of Mormonism at the fair for future scholars to dissect and elaborate on. Indeed, this is Neilson’s true contribution.  

To return to the original question regarding what was at stake in being “western,” Mormonism found that a more positive relationship to the nation depended upon this new distinction. Whatever was meant by the term, it seems clear that it signified “American.” As such, instead of speaking on Mormon themes, such as the Book of Mormon, temples, and religious freedom, Mormon men and women spoke instead of settlement building and on pioneering rather than prophets and saints. In this case, “western” represented an identity that Mormons, though perhaps not Mormonism, could fit into. As Neilson put it, “the church was eventually integrated into Americana in spite of, not because of, its religious contributions” (178).

As Neilson reminds us, Mormonism’s effective PR campaign did not begin with the “Mormon moment” in 2011-2012, but rather the World’s Fair of 1893. Recognizing this early history we learn a bit about what was at stake in being defined “western” as well as the enthusiasm Americans held in its celebration. Mormonism’s success in PR has little to do with the nation beginning to appreciate religious difference, but rather because Mormons allowed them to forget their religious difference by blinding them with being “western.” In asking why presidential contender Mitt Romney rarely speaks of his faith in public, we can recognize that it likely has something to do with his recognition that America may not be ready for a “Mormon” in the Whitehouse, however much they have come to accept the idea of a president who happens to be Mormon.         

"Building Up What Needs to be Destroyed"

by Sara M. Patterson

One of my favorite comments from the Religion and the American West seminar at this year’s AAR—and, mind you, there were many comments worthy of quotation—was in response to a question posed by a first timer to the seminar: “What makes the West really distinct?”  In asking that question, our visitor tapped into the discussions that we’ve been having for the past four years: what really makes the West distinct?  The first response came from Greg Johnson, this year’s respondent.  He argued that the emphasis shouldn’t be on the really, rather that the West need only be sufficiently different to sustain interesting and on-going conversations.  A second response to the question came from Jim Bennett, co-chair of RAW.  He said that as a group we knew that our regionalism skirted on exceptionalism but that we still felt there was value to focusing our attention on religion in the American West: “We are building up what we know needs to be destroyed; we’re doing both simultaneously.”  I appreciated how well those comments seemed to epitomize much of what the seminar and its participants have tried to do.
   
Because all four of the papers presented can be found by following the instructions here, I will not attempt to summarize each author’s argument.  Rather, I will try to tease out several themes (or several manifestations of one theme) that I saw surface in this year’s discussion.  I hope that others will respond and explore the themes that stood out to them because this is in no way a comprehensive list. I am encouraged here by the comments given by Greg Johnson, whose response can be found here.  Johnson suggested that the panelists explore secondary order arguments that would promote comparison and cross-talk, while recognizing that comparisons in the past (and today) often function in a bullying fashion, forcing peoples and their spiritual identities into categories that they might not recognize themselves.  Nonetheless, Johnson argued for a cautious exploration of the larger relevance of each of the specific papers’ arguments.
   
The first theme that stood out to me was the role of “the West” in nation formation.  Several of our panelists noted that “the west” was not always geographically west of wherever the United States was, and yet “the West” was the space on which Americans played out their futuristic, often millennial, hopes for the nation.  As one participant noted, it was in the American imagination what America “ought to be.” This desire to create the ideal “American” (read also Protestant Christian) space, led to some very serious revisionist histories that “disappeared” indigenous peoples and wildernesses (and Muslims and animists in the Philippines), that flat out rejected whatever was deemed “non-Christian” (ie. Groups like Mormons), and re-read, in order to claim, certain histories (such as California’s Spanish, Catholic past).  All of these strategies were part and parcel of the formation of an idealized American identity.  Brandi Denison offered an important caution to our discussion of ‘disappearances,’ one later echoed by John-Charles Duffy: that in talking about disappearances and constructing these activities as the act of disappearing, we may well be participating in our own forms of romanticization.
   
The second theme that emerged in the papers was the theme of different groups—in these papers Mormons and Jews—claiming an American Indian past in order to foster a particular group identity.  This process stood out most clearly in Sarah Imhoff’s work which analyzed the reasons why supporters of the Galveston movement—a movement to place newly immigrated Jews in the American West—might be interested in the argument that Jews were somehow tied to American Indian ancestry, an argument that had been made since the colonial settlement of the Americas. 
   
The third theme that is intimately tied to the previous two was the way Catholics, Mormons and American Indians (particularly Utes, in our discussion), played a role in creating these visions of the past, present and future.  As Katherine Moran pointed out, Catholics played a key role in creating a romantic Catholic past in the pacific west, they were integral in portraying themselves as the predecessors of American Protestants.  In a similar vein, the Utes were not passive players in the creation of historical narratives that tied to the present day.  As an example Greg Johnson brought up the fact that the Utes currently own a tiny piece of the area surrounding Mesa Verde even though they have no blood connection to the ancient Pueblo who dwelt there.  Although there is no blood connection, the Utes have set up a hot dog stand where a tourist economy allows them the possibility of connecting with the esteemed and romanticized native past portrayed at Mesa Verde.
   
The final statement that caught my attention and may not be a ‘theme’ from the seminar this year, but is certainly worthy of note, was Johnson’s claim that Mormonism was “God’s gift to people who study religion.”  The argument behind this comment was simply that Mormon history is so rich and full of data about the founding of a new religious movement.  Johnson encouraged seminar participants to use their own approach to teaching Mormonism as a type of litmus test: If one can’t teach about Mormonism as a serious religious movement, then there “is something wrong with your methodology.”  I think this is an excellent reminder that I will use to end my comments about this year’s seminar. What stood out most to me was that we should be constantly questioning our methodologies while also continuing to explore, compare and make secondary-order arguments.  We should, indeed, continue the task of building up what we know needs to be destroyed.
  
Editors' note: Stay tuned for further conversation about our recent AAR session!  Did you go?  What did you think?  Leave your thoughts in the comments!  ALSO, coming up next week: Tisa Wenger kicks off our Book of the Month series with a review of Darren Dochuk's From Bible Belt to Sunbelt: Plain-Folk Religion, Grassroots Politics, and the Rise of Evangelical Conservatism (W.W. Norton, 2010).